don't ever wanna let you down
by Lorata
Summary: Devon from District 2 wins his Games as the Kissing Killer, a ruthless tribute who romanced four of the Careers in the Arena and killed two of them in the throes of passion. But what the cameras show in the Arena isn't always what it seems ... [Prompt: Kill Me Mourn Me]
Britta wears her hair in pigtails, golden curls bouncing over her smoothly muscled shoulders. She eschews the heavy weaponry, ignoring the spears and the maces even though Devon catches her eye sliding over them as she skips past and picks up a pair of delicate throwing knives. She whips them at the target with fluid motions, and they all hit the centre rings but her eyes are distant, bored. This isn't what she wants to do. After the brace is spent she pulls a curl to her mouth, brushing it across her lips, then winks at Devon and saunters off to the knot-tying station.

Devon watches her go, his stomach churning as her hips swing with every artful step. The Centre trained Devon in image and the importance of camera-pleasing since he was eleven years old but it's nothing like this. He can't imagine being Britta and having to calculate every single movement, not just for showmanship and deadliness but also sex appeal and femininity and — it doesn't even make sense. She has to be dangerous and deadly but not _threatening_ , pretending she doesn't know how to use a spear or an axe — asking Devon to fetch the heavier weights — without losing her overall aura of competence.

It's a fine line to walk that Devon could never, ever manage; his image might involve sharper smiles and harsher laughs than he normally would, but he doesn't have to downplay his skills. If anything he has to amp his up, prove that he's worthy of his spot and his eventual place as Pack leader despite not being as stoic or flashy or crazy as his predecessors. Devon's routine in training is the opposite of Britta's; rather than ignoring weapons that aren't pretty enough or in line with a carefully crafted image, Brutus has told him to hit absolutely everything he can to prove his versatility. That way when he chooses a non-standard weapon in the Arena, they won't think it's because he can't handle a sword.

One morning the girl from Eleven snorts as Britta giggles and flirts with the hand-to-hand coach, and it takes all of Devon's control not to snap at her and tell her to show some respect. Eleven is a farmhand, tall and strong and experienced with a scythe, but she hasn't trained every day since hitting Reaping age, hasn't killed with her bare hands or learned to smile and simper and look beautiful after two weeks without showering and a layer of mud covering every inch of skin. She's allowed to be who she wants, unapologetic and snarling and unpleasant, and it will be Britta laughing in the Arena when Eleven is starving and dehydrated with sepsis running through her veins and she realizes none of her sneering will buy her salve or water or a crust of bread.

He can't say that, though, because the Gamemakers are watching and that's not how Devon needs to play the game. He's not Britta's defender and it would only doom her if he did, and so instead he twirls a sword in his hand, shoots Eleven a nasty-sweet smile and asks if she'd like to go a few rounds, since she's clearly better than everyone else here. Eleven flushes and stalks away, and Devon rolls his eyes in an exaggerated gesture for the Gamemakers' benefit and challenges Sheen instead.

At lunch Britta plops herself into Devon's lap and drapes one arm over his shoulders, nuzzling herself into the curve of his neck as she reaches down and snags a bite right from his fork. Devon snorts and gives her a light, playful slap on the thigh, demanding to know how she's going to pay him back for it. Britta bats her eyelashes at him and shoots him a sly smile but doesn't answer, and everyone at the table groans and threatens to throw food at them.

Britta wriggles in his lap, and before leaving for the afternoon session she leans in close. "You really are gay," she says, low in his ear. "I'm impressed. If you're looking for a little fun, you should try Four. I know for a fact he'd be down for it." She nips at his earlobe before sliding off his lap and flicking her fingers in a wave; Devon schools his expression from the instinctive horror into one he hopes is convincing enough frustration at her apparent teasing.

(It's not convincing enough. That night Brutus corners him, demands to know what happened, and when Devon spills out the whole thing he grits his teeth and orders Devon to do laps around the halls until dinner.)

* * *

"The girl is dangerous," Brutus warns when she scores a 10 in her private session, tied for first with Devon's district partner. "She's flashy and she's selling herself as much as she is her skills, but don't let that catch you. Girls from One don't make it here just because they're pretty. She'll want to trick you into underestimating her, but don't."

Devon knows, he's seen the frustration when she goes through the motions in training, but he also knows better than to interrupt his mentor. Instead he nods, and Brutus looks at him for a moment, eyes narrowed, before he sighs. "Look," Brutus says. "This year they want flashy, and that ain't your style, but if you want to win it's gonna have to be. Find some way to spice it up."

"Yes sir," Devon says. His dinner sits in his stomach like a rock, but he can do this.

"It's not enough just to win." Brutus pins him with his stare, and Devon swallows. "You gotta make them glad it's you and not anyone else. Understand?"

Devon says "Yes sir" again, swallowing his own doubt. There's no room for uncertainty in the Arena; his mentor has given him an order, and it's Devon's job to find a way to see it through.

* * *

Two days later, Devon and the others poke through the supplies in the Cornucopia as the bodies of the initial fallen cool on the ground around them. Blood soaks into the soil, flies buzzing over the corpses, and Devon swallows again and again to fight the rising gorge. It's not like the kill tests, not at all, the twelve-year-olds with their wide eyes staring at him, mouths falling open as Devon descended with his blade, but that doesn't matter. None of it matters, only the game and Victory.

Devon took out three, both the little ones to save them a messier, more painful death later, and the middleweight from Seven to make that less obvious. Britta has two herself, both long and painful, hamstring slashes to take them down while she returned to finish the job later. Her eyes gleam as she tilts her knife, watching the blood drip down the blade onto the ground, and there's nothing playful or coquettish about her until she catches Devon's eye on her. Like flicking a switch, her flirtatious smile appears and the devil's light in her eyes fades, but Devon won't forget her expression any time soon.

The audience wants spectacle, and Devon needs to convince them he's as entertaining as a half-mad girl who can make the blood splashed across her throat as alluring as ribbons and lace. Meanwhile they all have to keep interest up in the long stretches between kills, as they'll have to space them out to no more than one per day for the next week. Devon takes in the rest of the Pack, all attractive, vicious trained killers in their prime, but they're also teenagers. Maybe —

"Hey," Devon calls over to Britta, who tosses her hair over her shoulders and sends him a dazzling smile. "Blood looks good on you."

"Yeah?" Britta grins and sheathes her knives at her waist. "Doesn't look too bad on you, either. Taking out those kids first off so no one else could have any fun? I wasn't sure you had it in you."

Devon keeps the surprise off his face; even if they're not friends, even if they've had no actual real conversations in their entire time together, a girl like Britta should be able to recognize another sadist. She'd know that Devon's intention was to spare the kids as much pain as possible, so why act like she doesn't know?

 _Be careful,_ Brutus warned. _She'll want you to underestimate her._

Britta's gaze flicks to one of the invisible floating cameras above their heads, and her eyelid twitches in the hint of a wink. All at once it hits Devon that this is an exchange; he's kept her close during training, reminded the Gamemakers and the audiences that she's deadly even when the other tributes scoffed, and gave her the opportunity for a sponsor-beloved romance without the worry that he'll actually want to make good on the offers. It's a trade, reputation for reputation; Britta stays sexy and deadly and protected, and Devon gets to be the guy dark enough to go after kids for fun.

"I'm full of surprises," Devon says. He slides his arm around her waist, and she grins and nestles up against his side. The rest of the Pack joins them in straggling lines, and they gather their supplies and head out so the corpse wagons can do their jobs.

* * *

Devon kisses Britta that night after the anthem, when the others stretch out around the campfire and they're on watch. Britta makes soft, greedy noises against his mouth and rolls her hips against his as she straddles his lap, but the funny thing about not being into girls is that Devon recognizes the same flawless performance from Britta. She leans her head back, hair falling around her shoulders, and Devon grips her waist and trails bites down her neck.

They're separated and sharpening their weapons when the next pair wakes up to take the following shift, and Britta sends Devon a fake-private grin just between them and millions of viewers.

* * *

The next day he takes the Four boy out to search for firewood, only to push him up against a tree and kiss him breathless. This one is harder to keep professional, since Noah is good-looking and more than willing, but Devon has trained too much to disappear entirely. It means he hears the footsteps in the underbrush long before the girl from Eleven bursts from the trees with a wicked blade in her hand; Devon, having never let go of his weapon because he's not an idiot, spins and drives the point of his glaive into her chest.

She falls with an almost comical look of shock frozen on her face, and as the cannon fires Devon turns back to Noah with a grin and a wink. "Where were we?" he says, and leans in for another kiss.

When they make it back to camp, Britta throws a pinecone at Devon's head. "You asshole! I thought you two were slipping away to make out or something, and here you were hunting!"

Noah flushes, and anyone with half a brain will know what happened and that means Britta definitely will, but Devon only holds out his hands. "What can I say, we got lucky," he says, grinning as Britta's district partner rolls his eyes in the background.

* * *

Sheen, the boy from One, bites more than he kisses and leaves scratches along Devon's arms that he has to hide with salve from a jar in the Cornucopia. Morgana, from Four, keeps her knife pointed at his throat the whole time — Devon wraps an arm around her waist and angles his own blade at her ribs — yet nearly wakes the others with the sounds of her enthusiasm before Devon kisses her hard to keep her quiet.

All of them think they're the only ones, except for Britta. "Heartbreaker, hm," she hums one night, combing her fingers through his hair as she settles into his lap. The glow from the fire flickers on her hair, bringing out the murder-light in her eyes. "You keep being full of surprises."

"Rat me out and I'll kill you," Devon says in a low voice, quiet enough not to wake their companions but not so soft that the microphones won't catch it.

Britta leans close and bites his ear. "I'm counting on it," she says, little more than a whisper, then she pulls back and her mouth meets his in a challenge.

Devon can't afford to let anything rattle him, but her words turn over in his mind long after his watch ends and he lies down to sleep.

* * *

(He doesn't kiss his district partner. There are lines.)

* * *

Nine days in, the Pack is ready to split. Tensions are up, supplies are dwindling, and whatever outliers survived have hidden themselves too well to be flushed out by hunting expeditions. The next big dramatic moment will be when the Careers turn on each other, only none of them want to strike first. The split means a drop in sponsor funds, since they're no longer pooled together, with no one to watch their backs at night or during a surprise attack.

The alliance was only ever temporary, but in the Arena nothing and everything is real all at once.

Devon finds himself gravitating to Britta that night on their watch, moving outside the circle so the warmth from the fire is an afterthought against his skin rather than an ever-present heat. Britta straddles him as usual, but this time she hooks her legs around his waist and rocks backward, pulling him her until her shoulders hit the ground and Devon braces himself on top of her.

It blocks most of the cameras without them having to do much, and Britta slides one hand up the back of Devon's shirt and pulls him down close. Her eyes are wild and white-rimmed as she looks up at him, and there's no hint of the teasing smile or flirtatious flutter of her lashes. "Tonight," she says. Her nails dig into his back. "Tonight, do it tonight. Please, it has to be you and it has to be now."

Devon leans down and bites her throat. "Why?" he asks. It's a risky question but he has to ask; has any Career tribute ever asked another to do the job? None of the tapes they showed in the Centre had anything like this, only outlying tributes desperate to make a quick end instead of bleeding out or starving. Then again, not everything from the Arena makes it to the broadcasts, and Devon knows more than anyone that not everything that does is real. Maybe deals like this are more common than he thinks.

"I can't win," Britta hisses. "I won't. You don't know what it's like for us out there, after. What they'll want me to do. Just do it! You want to win, don't you?"

Devon's breath sticks in his chest, but he nods. He starts to reach for his knife, but Britta's hand closes over his wrist. "No," she whispers. "They'll kill my family if they think I wanted it to happen." To cover what might be a suspicious gesture, Britta moves Devon's hand to her waistband. "Please?" she asks, this time loud enough for the cameras.

Devon feels the heat rise from his collarbone to his hairline. He and Noah have gone the furthest of any of them, and that only because Devon has no experience with girls and a Two shouldn't show weakness or incompetence at anything. "Are you sure?" he asks, splaying her fingers at the curve of her hip, finding the bone and tracing along it. Britta arches her back in invitation. "I don't — I've never —"

"You're a smart boy," Britta drawls, shifting so Devon can work his hand inside her jumpsuit. "Improvise."

It's far more complicated with girls than with boys, and Devon can't imagine he's very good at it, but Britta knows how to play this for the camera just like everything else. She throws her head back and bites her lip to stifle the sounds, and if Devon didn't know better he'd think he was a skilled lover. Except that after a while an edge of real desperation bleeds into the calculated throes of artificial passion, and Britta bucks her hips and digs her heel into his calf.

"Now," she says with her mouth against his throat, and Devon feels the word through her lips on his skin more than he hears it. "Before it's over, please —"

His dagger slides between her ribs and finds her heart with terrifying ease. Devon wrenches it loose and pulls back in time to catch the light fades from her eyes even as the beatific smile never leaves her face. Time slows as the blood pounds in his chest, his ears, his temples, and Devon winds up and throws his knife as far as he can. As soon as it leaves his hand he flings himself backward, across the campsite, where he leans against a tree and feigns sleep. He has just enough time to rest his glaive across his lap, like he's dozed off on watch, when Britta's cannon fires.

Devon jolts 'awake' with the others, where they find Britta's body splayed at the edge of the camp, murdered by an outlier who stabbed her in her sleep and fled. The others fan out to check the nearby clearing, but their imaginary attacker is long gone. Devon looks down at Britta's body, and it's easier than he thought — and far more than he'd like — to dredge up regret.

Sheen laughs and shoves him, but the laugh is sharper and the shove harder than their usual banter. The cracks are showing, and he bares his teeth and looks Devon up and down. "You're slipping, Two," he says. "Fall asleep on guard and one of us gets offed? Guess we know who's off watch and on exclusive firewood duty from now on."

"Fuck you," Devon says, gripping the handle of his weapon in case his hands tremble. "I didn't see you waking up in time to save her, either."

"We should move out," Morgana says, cutting them off as Sheen steps into Devon's space and Devon lifts his chin in challenge. "If we've got a hunter, we need to find a more defensible camp. Dicks away, boys, now let's move."

* * *

Devon slits Noah's throat with his own knife as they kiss the next evening before settling in for the night, away from camp while securing the area for traps. The blood sprays forward and splatters Devon in the face, hot and sticky and damning as it stains his shirt, but somehow as Devon crashes back into the camp, blood-splattered and clutching the fresh, self-inflicted wound at his side but with an unbloodied weapon, they believe his story of an ambush.

"We should split up," Sheen says. They look from one to another, grim faces and Devon bleeding slowly onto the grass. "We're a target as a group, and clearly —" he glares at Devon, "— sticking together isn't doing us any favours."

"Agreed," snaps Morgana. She's already got a pack slung over her shoulder, weapons strapped to her waist. "It's been fun. May the odds, and all that."

They all exchange glances, and by some unspoken signal they all turn and melt into the trees. It's a testament to — something — that no one flings a knife at anyone else's back while they leave.

* * *

Two hours later both Britta and Noah appear in the sky, and Devon, his side stitched up with supplies from a small medpak Brutus sent him, tips his head back. He can't salute, not without breaking his callous killer image, and so Devon keeps any expression off his face as the feelings inside him swirl.

A hundred years ago, when Devon spent three weeks in the woods during his Field Exam, he'd started to imagine someone following him. A shadow, large and dark and cackling, waiting for Devon to lose his concentration for even a second so it could take him over. In the days following, lying in the hospital and recovering from severe dehydration and mild malnutrition, Devon recognized his invisible stalker as the spectre of madness.

He feels it now again, fingers trailing across his shoulder blades. Devon brushes it off with a full-body shudder, except — except. Except everything he has is in his pockets, he's maybe halfway through his stint in the Arena, and a dead girl smiled and twisted her fingers in his hair as he killed her.

Devon stops, turns his face up to the sky, and closes his eyes. He takes one deep breath and lets the monster catch him.

* * *

He doesn't lose himself, not exactly, but it's close enough.

* * *

A month later Devon curls up on the sofa, a quilt pulled up around him despite the summer heat. Brutus sits on the end near his feet, silently going through paperwork. In the end Devon only killed seven, the benchmark for a Career Victor who doesn't want to be a disappointment, but he feels every single one of them as a weight on his shoulders. Six tributes who only wanted to survive, same as Devon —

— and Britta.

"She wanted me to kill her," Devon mumbles. He hasn't talked about it much; the meds Brutus feeds him make the words swim in his mind and jumble when he tries to line them up properly. "So I killed her. Did I do okay?"

Brutus sighs. "You won, kid. That means yes."

"No it doesn't!" Devon heaves himself up, or tries, but the blankets tangle around him and he flops back down, exhausted. Britta's face swims behind his eyes and he still feels the shift of her hips as she canted herself against him. The resistance as his dagger struck her heart and he dragged it sideways so the wound wouldn't close before she bled out. "I need — I just need to know I did the right thing, killing her then. She said she didn't want to win, she said — she said it would've been bad for her, if she'd won. Was she right?"

The couch creaks, and Brutus fishes under the blanket until he finds Devon's ankle and squeezes it, his broad hand nearly circling entirely. "Yeah," he says finally. "It's different in One. We'll talk about it sometime. For now, sleep."

Brutus' words aren't actually meant as an order, no one can do that, but Devon's eyelids droop anyway. He struggles against it, holding his eyes wide even as they threaten to close on their own. "Do you think she's happy, wherever she is?" Devon asks. They don't ever talk about that, in the Centre, what happens when tributes die, where people go. In the quarries people are buried with their heads pointing toward the sierras, and the souls of the worthy dead are reborn as mountain hawks, but no one ever told him if that counts for people outside of Two.

Brutus pauses, then he pats Devon's foot. "Sure, kid," he says. "I bet she is."

He leaves his hand there, solid and reassuring, and Devon lets the medication drag him down for sleep. He dreams in confused, fuzzy snatches, and wakes with the afterimage of gold curls and a bright smile, and a smooth hand on his forehead. Devon blinks and it disappears, but the feeling of peace stays with him.

"I think," Devon says slowly, "maybe I could eat something today."

Since making it home he's eaten nothing but protein shakes and soup, too exhausted to make the effort to chew, and Brutus favours him with a small smile. "Sure thing," he says. "Sit tight, I'll bring it to you."

Devon sits up, the blanket wrapped around him like a cocoon, and shuffles over to the window. He's kept the curtains shut, the sun too bright and cheerful for the storm raging in his head, and now Devon grasps one edge and drags the fabric to the side. The sudden sun makes him squint, and for a second Devon nearly panics and shuts it again, but no. No, he can do this. A quick heave and the sash opens, letting in the soft scent of the pines and the flowers someone planted in the back garden before he came home.

It's too soon to eat outside — the thought crosses his mind before an immediate stab of panic follows, too much open space, no way to defend himself from attack — but Devon stumbles back to the couch and flops back down in a vaguely seated position. Brutus comes back out from the kitchen bearing a plate of sandwiches, cut into small pieces like Mom used to do for Devon's little sister, and he sets it down on the coffee table.

"Here," Brutus says. "Dig in, kid. You deserve it."

Devon licks his lips, and for a second he feels the ghost of Britta's fingers again but they pass soon enough. "You too," he says, giving Brutus a mock-stern look. "You've been sitting here watching me for days."

Brutus leans down, picks up a triangle of sandwich and pops it in his mouth. "There," he says, shoving the food into his cheek to talk. "Your turn."

Devon had his last real meal the day after Britta died, and his stomach clenches in protest but he takes a deep breath and lets it out. "My thanks," he says, and the formal expression of gratitude could be to Brutus, to the Capitol, to the universe — even to Britta, wherever she may be — and it doesn't really matter. Brutus grunts in answer, and Devon picks up his sandwich and takes a large bite.

* * *

Snow floats down from the sky in white, fluffy flakes as Devon stands onstage and stares out over the crowd. The drugs in his system give everything a light haze around the edges, and everything feels muted as though wrapped in wool. District 1 is the last stop on Devon's Tour before the Capitol and then home, and it's not honourable or worthy of a Victor but right now all Devon can think about is his bed back home and the big tree outside his window where Brutus hung a bird feeder so he has something to stare at in the dead of winter.

At least until the screens flicker on and he stares at Britta, her image projected three storeys high and wearing a solemn expression Devon doesn't ever remember seeing on her actual face while she lived. He recalls the photo shoot, how they asked him to turn his head and stare at the camera for a good ten minutes, but in the haze of preparation Devon hadn't connected that they'd been filming his death reel. When he won did they archive the footage or throw it away? Over 1,400 tributes since the Games' inception, they can't possibly keep everything.

A gust of wind whips the snow into his face, stinging in his eyes before it passes and the weather returns to pretty and picturesque. Devon catches himself drifting and forces himself to concentrate on the mayor's speech, the manufactured lines about dignity and sacrifice that must taste funny after Devon kissed and killed both tributes. Does the mayor know that Britta never intended on coming home? Do the teenage girls in pale grey coats with shiny curls and intent stares under their hoods, too pretty and poised to be anything but Careers in training?

Focus, Devon reminds himself. He digs his nails into his palms for grounding, takes a deep breath of the knife-cold air and exhales as slowly as he can to avoid giving himself away with a puff of vapour in front of his face with all the country watching.

District 2's current escort wrote Devon's speech and Brutus had him practice it on the train ride over from Three until he could churn it out without having to think about it. Now Devon steps up to the microphone, clasps his hands behind his back and recites the words to perfection, purposely avoiding letting them settle and get their talons into his mind. He also keeps his eyes focused on the blank expanse of wall between the tribute portraits, letting Britta and Sheen flicker out of focus at the corners of his vision.

He makes almost to the end when movement on one of the stages draws Devon's eye. A little girl standing on the platform below Britta's portrait stumbles, and her older sister — still below Reaping age, or just barely into it — yanks her to her feet and whispers harshly in her ear. They turn back to the stage, staring with a singleminded, fierce intensity, and the older one narrows her eyes and holds Devon in place with her gaze. Two pretty little girls standing by their parents, and they're too far for Devon to catch anything of bone structure or facial similarities but they must be Britta's sisters.

It's not rare; most of the tributes from the districts had large families, more mouths to feed but more to bring in tesserae and work, and even though Career Victors don't have parents or siblings to keep the mythos alive, the dead tributes do. If Devon had died they would have found his parents, his three older brothers and his younger sister and had them stand on the stage, solemn and silent.

Still, seeing Britta's family twigs something in Devon's brain that nearly causes him to slip on his words, though he catches himself before it comes out on camera. He finishes without a misstep, and Brutus steps up beside him to lead him back into the Justice Building as the mayor and mentors flank him.

The heavy oak doors creak and slam shut behind them with a loud _boom_ that reverberates through the open hall, and as the pale sunlight disappears and Devon blinks in the sudden dimness the memory finally coalesces.

 _They'll kill my family if they think I wanted it to happen_ , Britta said, quiet and desperate in his ear with her fingers digging into his wrists. At the time he'd accepted it as fact without more than a brief shudder, written it off as another layer of pressure on Britta's already weighted shoulders. He hadn't considered the flip side of it: that Britta's family would be dead if Devon hadn't managed to sell her murder as an act of cold-blooded aggression on his part.

The girls onstage, they'll have seen Devon kiss their sister and slide a knife between her ribs. They'll hate him for murdering her, for befriending her and manipulating her trust and everything else that's part of Devon's narrative as the Kissing Killer, the name the Capitol magazines have saddled him with whether he likes it or not. With luck they'll never know her fear, the desperation that drove her to fight and kill to keep them safe, to protect them from the consequences of her own failure. If the universe has any justice, Britta's death will buy them a long and peaceful life.

If Devon had panicked, if he'd let Britta's final wish slip to the cameras, to Caesar Flickerman, to the president, to anyone where those in power could hear, then those little girls would not be alive to hate him now. The weight of it staggers him, so much that he stumbles and Brutus steadies him with a hand on his arm. A District 1 mentor makes a crack about Twos and their pharmaceutically-approved recovery cocktails, asking why don't they turn to morphling or alcohol like any respectable Victor; Brutus grunts and the air in the room seems to crackle with a sudden layer of frost, but Devon barely registers.

The game was so much bigger than he thought, even then. Now he has a lifetime ahead of him and no idea what to do with it, and everything he does for the rest of his long years will have repercussions that ripple out far beyond what he can see or predict. They hinted at it in the Program — _it's never over_ they warn the final tribute candidates, and Brutus told him flat out in the hospital before his meeting with President Snow — but it never felt real to Devon, not really. Not like the two girls who'd be dead if the trainers hadn't made Devon the actor he is.

Devon can't tell Brutus, can't tell Britta's mentor, can't tell anyone, but as they walk through the back courtyard to the banquet hall, an odd warmth spreads through Devon's chest, chasing away the winter chill and the lingering shivers of guilt. He killed seven in the Arena but he saved one boy on Reaping Day by stepping up and two girls in District 1 without realizing, and if he works hard and mentors to the best of his ability then maybe one day he'll save someone else, just like Brutus.

"You all right?" Brutus asks, pulling him aside as the escorts argue about place settings and the District 1 Victors roll their eyes and make a show of yawning.

"Yeah," Devon says, surprised to find he means it. In all likelihood he's not safe from the demons, not yet, and the shadow of madness that chased him in the Arena will come back to whisper in his ear tonight, but for now, in this moment, the two little girls on their way home safely have given Devon the push to make it through the day. And really, that's all life is, moment after moment after moment, sunrise to sunset to sunrise until it's over.

Britta's mentor gives Devon a speculative look as they sit down to lunch, and maybe she told Britta to stay away from the Two boy, spinning tales of ruthlessness and brutality, or maybe she said the opposite, told her of the district's reliable savagery. Would she have told Britta to stick with Devon to better turn on him later, or because it would give Devon the best opportunity to be her executioner? Would a ever mentor wish their tribute didn't walk out alive?

So many questions and none that Devon can ask at an official dinner, and anyway the mentor soon turns away to make conversation with her elbow partner. Brutus raps Devon's plate with his fork, the sharp sound of steel against porcelain startling him back to his surroundings. "Eat," Brutus says, giving him a warning look.

The first course is soup, easy on Devon's stomach, and the others are watching and his escort will have a full complement of suggestions to give him about his table manners before the Capitol dinner at the president's mansion, and so he nods and picks up his spoon. Outside the snow falls thick and fast, the sky turning a deep grey as the clouds gather on the horizon, but the food tastes good and Devon is alive to eat it, and somewhere, hopefully, Britta and the others who died for their districts can sleep in peace.


End file.
